There’s now at least one local home where it’s perfectly OK for children to climb the walls, thanks to a little help from a Newmarket contractor with a kind heart.
When former mover turned self-employed contractor Geoffrey Clark read on social media that local resident Lulu Lotus was looking for quotes for someone to install a rock-climbing wall in her two young sons' playroom, he was outraged at the prices some people were quoting.
After reading more about Lotus in a story published on NewmarketToday April 12, 2019, about how she left an abusive two-year marriage and stayed for a while in a women’s shelter with her babies before getting back on track, he knew he had the winning quote: free.
“I thought she could use the help, so I brought over a piece of wood and fastened it to the wall with eight screws. It took about an hour,” said Clark, a Newmarket Heights resident who has been running Fine Edge Painting and Contracting for about five years. “Her kids are great. I really enjoyed being there.”
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Lotus said this random act of kindness has restored her faith in humanity.
“I feel so grateful,” she said. “I was quoted up to to $300 and, as a single mom, that was not within my budget. Geoff has a heart of gold.”
The creative single mom, who now writes vegan-friendly storybooks for children, painted the climbing wall herself and fashioned rocks out of hardened plastic. She then covered the floor in mattresses to soften any falls from the wall.
Clark, a father of three himself, with two girls, 1 and 3, and a son, 8, said he takes kindness to heart and jumps at the chance to show people there are honest “nice-guy” contractors out there.
“It’s the simple little things that make people happy,” he said, about his satisfaction-guaranteed work policy. “I do the little extras for clients, like applying a third coat of paint at no charge if it’s needed.”
That work ethic has led to plenty of referrals and word-of-mouth jobs for Clark, who handles large and small residential and commercial projects such as flooring, painting, framing and dry-walling, moulding, and more.
“I’m a nice guy to everybody,” Clark said. “Sometimes, when I offer to do things for free for people in need, they think it’s too good to be true.”
For more information on Fine Edge Painting and Contracting, visit Facebook.